Bookish Matters

The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.

—Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

Friday, August 13, 2010

By Heart

In his day, he said, students were grounded in spelling and had learned poetry and the Bible by heart. An odd phrase, "by heart," he would add, as though poems were stored in the bloodstream.
-A.S. Byatt, Possession


What do you need for a four-hour plane ride returning from LA? A thick novel about blue stockings researching dead poets, beautifully and wittily written, to remind you why you're about to start grad school to study English? Indeed.
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1 comment:

  1. AnonymousAugust 14, 2010 at 8:57 AM

    Oh, I am so glad that you are finally reading this. And I hope that your enjoyment sticks... I remember that my attention waned as the book went along, and the romance bit was the weakest part of the story. But it does make you excited about literary scholarship, doesn't it?

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